Mayank Chhaya speaks to Dr. Orville Schell, one of America's foremost China-Tibet scholars

South Asia Monitor

6 months ago

Mayank Chhaya speaks to Dr. Orville Schell, one of America's foremost China-Tibet scholars | SAM Conversation

Transcript

00:00With the Dalai Lama reaffirming that there will be a successor to him after his death,

00:22prospects of the historic standoff between China and the centuries-old institution

00:27continuing well beyond his lifetime are a certainty now.

00:32The Dalai Lama's second announcement about succession has predictably riled Beijing,

00:38which wants to impose its own Dalai Lama.

00:40There are now concerns that when Tenzin Gyatso, the current Dalai Lama, passes away,

00:45there could well be two rival ones, one officially chosen by his not-for-profit trust

00:51and the other propped up by the Chinese Communist Party.

00:54To understand the implications of the succession battle, MCR spoke to Dr. Orwell Schell,

01:01one of America's foremost China Tibet scholars and authors who have spent decades studying

01:06and writing about various issues arising out of the conflict, Dr. Orwell Schell.

01:13Welcome to Myang Chai Reports, Dr. Schell. It's always a great pleasure to have you.

01:18Well, pleasure to be with you.

01:19Dr. Schell, my sense of the Dalai Lama's announcement is that he is perhaps reclaiming future history

01:29rather than yielding to the short-term strategic temptation of outwitting China

01:36by naming a successor in his own lifetime.

01:40What is your sense?

01:41Well, I think it would be certainly out of normal tradition for him to name a successor

01:50before he passes away and a reincarnation then in the traditional form has a time to take place.

01:59So I think what he seems to be doing is to try to remove the whole decision-making process

02:08from the hands of the Chinese Communist Party.

02:11Having been through that once with the Panchen Lama and Cheki Naima,

02:17the reincarnation that was chosen then disappeared,

02:21and the Communist Party appointed their own reincarnation.

02:26I think that's what His Holiness wishes to avoid this go-around.

02:33But irrespective of what he has done, what is to stop Beijing from going ahead

02:38and appointing a rival Dalai Lama anyway?

02:41Well, I suspect Beijing will do it anyway.

02:45And there will be probably somebody in residence in the Potala in Lhasa,

02:51and you're going to have sort of like the two Vatican's, two popes in the Holy Roman Empire

03:00when you had Byzantium and Constantinople in Rome.

03:04So nonetheless, this is a way, I think, for His Holiness to assure that at least

03:11Tibetans that are living outside of Tibet have a spiritual leader.

03:16Is there any possibility at all that they might even do it in his lifetime,

03:22just to be mean about that?

03:26You mean that the Chinese Communist Party might?

03:29Yeah, they might just guard and appoint one right away in the next maybe couple of years

03:33or something like that.

03:35I suspect that would be a bit presumptuous.

03:39It's one thing for His Holiness to say that his reincarnation is preordained.

03:45It's another thing for the Communist Party who eschews spiritual matters of all kinds

03:51to make such a presumptuous dictum.

03:54But, you know, I wouldn't put anything beyond the Chinese Communist Party

04:01and particularly in the question of Tibet and Xinjiang,

04:06which are extremely sensitive topics.

04:10If you were Xi Jinping, how would you look at the announcement?

04:15Was it built into their strategic thinking already?

04:19Well, I mean, fortunately, I'm not Xi Jinping.

04:25I think that he will see it as a great affront,

04:29as a challenge to the sovereign power of China

04:34to determine what happens within its sovereign territory.

04:37And remember, it fully believes that Tibet is a sovereign part of China.

04:44When the nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek

04:48and then the communists under Mao Zedong drew the Chinese borders,

04:54they drew the old Qing dynasty borders,

04:56which included all of Tibet, all of Xinjiang, all of Mongolia,

05:00although they lost outer Mongolia, all of Manchuria.

05:03So it was the largest rendition of China in history.

05:09But even though Tibet had not been fully consolidated

05:12within the national entity, either under the nationalists

05:17or even completely under the communists, that was the presumption.

05:22So as the leader of Tibet,

05:25it's a curious combination of a political leader and a spiritual leader.

05:30China would like to imagine that it holds the reins in its hands

05:37to determine who that person should be,

05:40particularly not someone living in India.

05:42Right.

05:44Isn't that ironic that while on the one hand,

05:46the Communist Party clearly has atheistic underpinnings,

05:50on the other, they do recognize the,

05:52at least the symbolic importance of having heard the Lai Lama,

05:56which, how do they reconcile these two contradictory streams?

06:02I think politics trumps spiritual matters.

06:07And they don't, I mean, spiritual matters are just another element

06:11that they have to deal with and that can be manipulated,

06:15for better or worse, to the, to unify the, quote, motherland.

06:19So I don't think they waste a lot of sleep over it.

06:23There are many contradictions.

06:25Mao Zedong himself wrote many essays on contradictions.

06:28He loved contradictions.

06:30And he thought that's the way history moves.

06:32So such a contradiction as a spiritual matter and a temporal matter

06:36isn't one I'm sure the Chinese Communist Party leaders

06:42lose a lot of sleep over.

06:43There are reports out of Beijing I read in the New York Times

06:49and elsewhere, perhaps even on the BBC,

06:51that the government is already building a narrative

06:55where officials will go to schools and offices

06:59essentially to build up some, drum up some support.

Mayank Chhaya speaks to Dr. Orville Schell, one of America's foremost China-Tibet scholars | SAM Conversation

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